Perfume Legends: French Feminine Fragrances, by Michael Edwards. Won the lottery? Spring for this. The blossoming interest in all things fragrant has elevated many out-of-print books on the subject to the realms of ‘When my ship comes in…’ territory. One heck of a weighty, well-researched volume, this – from Michael Edwards, one of the world’s most knowledgeable perfume experts – this goes into great depth on some of the greatest fragrances ever created (all French, as the title notes), since the dawn of modern perfumery in 1882. Think: L’Heure Bleu, L’Air du Temps, Calandre, Coco, Boucheron, Trésor – the trail runs out in 1992 (shortly before the book was published), but all of us perfume-lovers should probably be lobbying the publisher for a reprint and an update.
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